Investor Watch: October 19, 2026

A South Korean refinery company aims to launch commercial operations at its $6.7 billion “Shaheen Project” in Ulsan in 2027. Anthropic and NTT will spend $6.3 billion on a new data center campus in Osaka. Power and technology engineering company M.C. Dean will create 1,950 jobs and invest $412.5 million in Virginia.

UPSTATE SOUTH CAROLINA INTELLIGENCE REPORT

Even as amenities and opportunities blossom and diversify in Upstate South Carolina, manufacturing remains the region’s beating heart.

NEWS DIGEST

Advanced air mobility gets new wings in Ohio. Global Location Strategies names its top 10 metros for aerospace & defense. Prysmian announces over $1 billion in investment in three U.S. sites. Apple commits over $30 billion toward Broadcom, which means silicon components and wireless connectivity production expansion in Colorado. Linde will build two new air separation units on its Phoenix campus. OpenAI aims to invest $20 billion in a new data center campus in Effingham County, Georgia, near Savannah.

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The NC Clean Energy Technology Center (NCCETC) last week released the latest edition of its Nuclear Energy Policy Dataset, a biannual tracking resource delivering state-by-state intelligence on commercial nuclear energy policy and market activity nationwide. Update, based on the same DSIRE database that informs the annual Site Selection Sustainability Rankings index, finds that 45 states and Puerto Rico took new action on commercial nuclear fission and fusion energy between April and September 2026, with New Jersey, Illinois, New York, Minnesota and Tennessee emerging as the most active.

“As the federal government eases licensing and permitting timelines for new nuclear deployment, states are taking advantage of the gains made nationally and are moving quickly from feasibility to engagement and siting options as load growth concerns turn into nuclear project opportunities,” “The technological progress is also hitting the fusion energy frontier,” said Justin Lindemann, project manager and lead nuclear energy policy and markets analyst at the NC Clean Energy Technology Center, “as federal definitions and allowances provide states with much more flexibility to determine licensing, permitting and deployment of a technology that is slowly transitioning from R&D to commercialization.”

Site Selection’s forthcoming November issue includes a nuclear energy report profiling the fusion opportunity. The publication has documented the nuclear power comeback for some time, including the January 2026 report “Nuclear Receives Boost in the Great Global Energy Race,” a number of stories chronicling nuclear industry progress and projects in Tennessee and stories from locations as diverse as the Mountain West, Virginia and Texas.

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The National Center for Science and Engineering Statistics at the National Science Foundation has released new federal facilities R&D data about R&D performance within both Department of Defense facilities and civilian federal facilities. “The year-to-year increase in federal R&D performance is buoyed by a substantial increase in the Department of Defense (DOD) R&D compared to the non-DOD, or civilian, agencies’ R&D,” the agency’s analysis found. “For example, DOD expenditures for R&D performance within its own facilities increased 16%; from $35.0 billion in FY 2024 to $40.6 billion in FY 2025. During the same period, the sum of all civilian agencies’ R&D performance declined 14% from $14.3 billion to $12.3 billion, driven primarily by a $1 billion decline in R&D expenditures at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and a $1.2 billion decline at the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).”

The images above show the difference made at one location along the Atlanta Beltline between 2012 and 2021.
Photos courtesy of Atlanta Beltline

Early this month, after a two-decade land assembly effort including over $200 million in property purchases across 270+ acres, the Atlanta Beltline announced it had secured the property needed to build the full mainline trail, which will span 22 miles and connect more than 45 neighborhoods. “The milestone offers a playbook for how cities can use long-term land acquisition and public infrastructure investment to support economic development, affordable housing and neighborhood connectivity,” the organization stated in a release. “Since the project’s inception, the Beltline Planning Area has attracted $14.2 billion in private investment, according to a recent economic impact analysis by Econsult Solutions, Inc.”

That analysis found private development activity has consistently followed new trail openings by 12 to 24 months. It noted 318 completed private projects, with 93 more in the pipeline, in the Planning Area. Currently, 16.7 continuous miles of the Beltline’s mainline trail are open to the public, with the full 22-mile loop scheduled for completion by 2030.

“Over 20 years, the Beltline secured approximately 90 deeds and 230 easements,” the organization said. “Individual purchases ranged from 15 square feet to 65 acres, with the Beltline team negotiating with nearly every type of landowner, from railroads, utilities and Fortune 500 corporations to homeowners, apartment complexes and religious organizations.” Meanwhile, the Beltline has secured 94 acres of land to support affordable housing and affordable commercial space. “To date, 4,555 affordable units have been created or preserved within the Beltline TAD, 81% of the goal of 5,600 units by 2030,” said the organization.